


Merc vs Metal : Skullcruncher Gets Skull-F#&ked

by RodimusDoctor



Series: Merc Vs Metal [3]
Category: Deadpool - All Media Types, Transformers (Bay Movies)
Genre: Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-30
Updated: 2017-03-31
Packaged: 2018-10-11 23:33:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10477032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RodimusDoctor/pseuds/RodimusDoctor
Summary: Cemetery Wind commander Howard Attinger sends two assets to the Mexican tourist theme park of Xel-Ha to investigate an energon reading. One of those assets is agent James Savoy, still recovering from injuries but able to remote-pilot a weapon designated Skullcruncher. The other asset is Deadpool, the merc with a mouth. What could possibly go wrong?





	1. Chimichanga Stakeout

**Author's Note:**

> Once again I am mining Cybertronian lore for another Transformers vs. Deadpool story. This one picks up more or less exactly where the last one left off, and brings back James Savoy. I'm building toward the confrontation in Mexico City mentioned by Lockdown and Attinger in Age of Extinction, and this is another stop along the way. It gave me a chance to play with some TF concepts, and lay some seeds for future stories. Enjoy!

The tourist attraction of Xel-Ha is one of Mexico’s better-known tourist traps. A large, shallow bay filled with exotic fish, larger than the average visitor has ever seen before. A place where visitors can rent goggles and snorkels for a reasonable fee, swim among the fish in the crystal-clear water, and have their backs mercilessly sunburned.

And, in Children’s World, right next to the Cliff of Courage, there’s a water slide. Who can forget the waterslide?

No one, that’s who.

Xel-Ha is a peaceful, fun and (reasonably) safe attraction. A place for families and newlyweds to enjoy one of nature’s splendors.

And it has a waterslide.

But...

This paradise has a serpent, a lurking evil. And when you’re dealing with lurking serpents of evil, you don’t send in more snakes.

You send a mongoose.

 

A bus from one of the many nearby resorts pulled up to Xel-Ha’s main entrance and disgorged a bunch of sweaty, peeling tourists. Most of them went straight for the changerooms, eager to jump in the water and cool off. More than a few ran for the toilets - the buses had no bathrooms, and the resort they’d come from had neglected to warn them about the drinking water. A couple didn’t make it. They were laughed at. And one middle-aged couple, whose rectums remained healthy, decided to grab a bite to eat. They headed not for the food options in the park itself, but rather to a spot on the far corner of the parking lot.

Where a lime-green chimichanga wagon sat. They knew it was a chimichanga wagon because of the words on the side. Wade’s Chimichanga Wagon, the words said. In English.

“Finally they listened to me!” the man said with pride. “Five times we’ve been coming here, and each time I told them, if ya’re gonna have Americans here, have some American food! With signs in American! And here it is, proof that if you talk to the right people, things’ll get done.”

“You are wonderful, dear,” his wife said.

They walked up to the truck and rapped on the closed awning. Another sign (also in American English) said ‘Closed’, but that didn’t deter them one bit.

“Open up in there!” the man said. “We want food. And you’d better take US dollars!”

If anyone inside the truck heard him, they kept it to themselves.

“Hey!” the man rapped his knuckles on the awning again. “I said, open up! We’re starving.”

Still no response.

“Let’s go, Stephen,” the woman said. “They must be closed.”

“Well, they’re gonna open up for us, Millie,” Stephen replied. “We paid to come here, didn’t we? They’re supposed to be providing a service. You hear me in there?” He took to slapping his palm on the awning. “Customer service! We did not give up our hard-earned money just to get stiffed by some lazy amigo who doesn’t wanna do his job and make us some proper American food. Get off your sombrero and get cookin’ before I come in there and beat the candy out of your piñata!”

A noise came from inside the wagon. Stephen smirked and nodded at Millie as if to say, that’s how you get shit done.

The metal awning snapped open and up, breaking Stephen’s nose. He fell to his butt and clutched his face while blood gushed from between his fingers.

“Son of a bitch!” he said, and he glared up at the man revealed at the serving window. He was about to say a lot more, with words a lot stronger than ‘bitch’. However, some deeply-buried animal instinct told him that would be a very bad idea.

Perhaps it was the swords sheathed on the proprietor’s back. Or the guns holstered at his sides. The red costume was unusual, especially the mask. And the fact he was wearing a ridiculously large sombrero was more than a little disturbing. The apron he wore over the red costume - the one that said I’ll Bag Your Burrito! - wasn’t confidence-inspiring, either.

“First of all,” said the red-clad man, “this isn’t really a chimmy wagon. It’s what you might call cover. As in, this is only pretending to be a wagon selling chimichangas. Seriously, if I had a van full of chimmys, you think I’d share with an asshole like you?  
“Second, I am not a lazy service worker. I’m a mercenary. Name’s Deadpool. I was in fact hard at work looking for dangerous alien robots when you insisted on distracting me.  
“Thirdly, and this is most important, chimichangas are Mexican food, not American! You idiot. You probably think Chinese food is American, don’t you? Well, it’s not. It’s Chinese! Just like pizza.”

Stephen stared helplessly up at Deadpool, his broken nose all but forgotten. Except it wasn’t, because broken noses hurt like friggin’ hell. Millie, whose nose was still fine (if ugly), also stared at the merc in the apron and sombrero, trying to sort the current situation into some semblance of reality. Two things stood out for her, and she voiced one of them.

“Mercenary?” she said.

“Ooh,” said Deadpool. “Did I say that?”

“Alien robots?” said Stephen, which just happened to be the second thing that had stood out for Millie.

“Did I say that too?” Deadpool said. “Aw, crap. Now my cover’s blown. I guess I’m gonna have to kill you.”

Stephen’s eyes went wide. Millie let off a gasp, and made as if to run.

“Oh no you don’t!” Deadpool had both guns out of his holsters and into his hands in an instant. “Hmm, gunshots would be loud, and then I’d have to dump your bodies... I’m trying to keep a low profile, here... okay, I won’t kill you.”

Stephen and Millie let out sighs of relief.

“I’ll kidnap you instead,” Deadpool informed them with what, under his mask, was no doubt a smile. “Get in the wagon. And I hope you like the taste of sweaty gym socks, because I’m all out of ball gags.”

 

Ten minutes later the middle-aged couple were tied and gagged and sitting on the wagon’s floor. Satisfied that they weren’t going anywhere and would no longer be a distraction, Deadpool returned to work. The interior of the wagon had the appearance of a kitchen but was in fact a command centre - a monitor flipped up from the oven, displaying a 3D map of the surrounding area. The image came courtesy of satellite data beamed down to the wagon’s cybertronian technology, combining radar and thermal imaging with alien scanning equipment. If a Decepticon showed its metal mug anywhere in the area, the wagon would know about it.

So far, the coast was clear. And it had been so for hours. Deadpool was secretly grateful for the middle-aged couple’s intrusion - it had been the most excitement he’d had all day.

Boy, was that depressing! If something interesting didn’t happen soon...

His phone rang just then, with the theme from Fraiser as the ringtone.

Oh great, Deadpool thought, reaching for the receiver. The boss was calling.

 

Howard Attinger, commander of Cemetery Wind, sat at his command desk at the CIA’s headquarters, a handset to his ear. On the monitor in front of him, he saw an aerial view of Xel-Ha. Look at them, he thought as he stared at the crowds in the park. Bunch of illegal immigrants waiting to happen. Then he realized most of the people below were probably American tourists, and was grateful he hadn’t made the comment out loud.

“Hello, Beast from X-Men 3,” said the voice of Deadpool. Attinger winced - where did he get all those nicknames from, anyway?

“The name is... oh, forget it. Anything to report?”

“Not a peep,” Deadpool replied. “Are you sure...”

“Our intel confirms the presence of a Cybertronian,” Attinger said. “Keep monitoring, but do not engage until my other asset arrives. Together you will flush the target out.”

He hung up before Deadpool could make some smart-alek remark. Or call him another name.

Attinger shifted his attention to another screen, a view of Xel-Ha from the ocean. As he watched, the tourist attraction grew larger and larger, signifying that the camera capturing the image was approaching Xel-Ha at a high rate of knots. Asset #2.

Good, Attinger thought. With him arriving on sight, even Deadpool couldn’t screw the mission up.

“Sir?” said the worthless lackey who’d arrived with a fresh cup of coffee. “Should you maybe have told the mercenary what your other asset actually is? I mean, he might think...”

“Is there sugar in that coffee?” Attinger said without turning around.

“Yes, sir! Two cubes, just like you...”

“I specifically instructed you to make my coffee black,” Attinger said.

“No, sir,” the hapless and extremely stupid lackey said. “I remember you said...”

“I take my coffee black.”

“But...”

“Are you questioning me?” Attinger said, and turned in his chair to glare at the lackey.

“No, sir!” the lackey said.

“Then why in Sam Hill would I take strategic advice,” he stood to loom, “from an idiot who can’t even get my coffee right?”

“W... wuh...”

“Go,” Attinger indicated the door. “And leave your mistake here on my desk. I want to remember it.”

“Yes sir,” the lackey said. He set the coffee down and ran from the room.

Attinger picked up the cup and took a long sip. “Ahh, just the way I like it.” He sat back down, and returned his attention to the screens in front of him.

The hunt was on.


	2. A Comedy of Mechs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Deadpool charges into battle against his target, a gigantic robot crocodile. At the same time, Savoy directs the Skullcruncher unit to attack his target, a a chimichanga wagon armed with alien tech! But is either one of them the real target? 
> 
> No. They aren't. And back at Cemetery Wind headquarters, Attinger desperately tries to get his assets to cease their attack on each other.

High over the Gulf of Mexico, the cybertronian bounty hunter Lockdown also had an eye on Xel-Ha. The majority of his focus was elsewhere - something was brewing at Chichen Itza, and there’d been an unconfirmed Prime sighting in Cancun - but he had one monitor devoted the Cemetery Wind’s current mission.

He was letting the humans handle this one alone. Lockdown was honestly curious to see if they could. After the debacle in Florida, the humans needed to redeem themselves in his optics. The loss of Slash had been vexing, to say the least.

And if the humans couldn’t handle the Xel-Ha situation? Well, he needed entertainment, the same as any being.

 

Deadpool sat in the cab of his wagon, his feet on the dash, a stuffed unicorn in his lap. At the back, Stephen and Millicent tried not to watch.

With a few final strokes Deadpool sighed and jizzed into Stephen’s ball cap. He could have let loose into the glory hole he’d cut into the unicorn’s ass, but he’d learned from experience the smell wouldn’t go away. He’d used up his extra socks, and anyway they were currently stuffed into the tourists’ mouths. In a pinch, the cap had done nicely.

Deadpool stood, zipped up, then walked to the back.

“Thanks, man!” he said, and slapped the cap back onto Stephen’s head. “You’re a pal.”

A blip noise caught his attention just then.

“Well, blow my brontosaurus!” Deadpool said. The scanners had detected an energon signature near the park, closing fast.

He straightened, put his hands on his hips and thought. His orders had been clear - sit tight and wait for the asset to arrive. But who knew when that would be? This was happening now, in real time!

Besides, he thought, Fraiser’s not the boss of me.

Deadpool hit a switch and a section of the kitchen transformed into a metal suit that was painted to match his costume. It opened up and Deadpool stepped in, and secured the helmet on his head.

“Drive!” he said, and the wagon roared to life. He returned to the cab, which had converted to accommodate the armour. Now in full mental control of the vehicle, Deadpool drove out of the parking lot and into the park.

“Fear not, innocent bystanders!” he said. “The Merc with the Mouth is Moving.”

 

Savoy sat up in his cot, making himself a tiny bit more comfortable. There was only so much comfort to be had, of course - both his legs were still knitting in casts, and his shoulder throbbed with agony. He had refused painkillers, at least for the time being. He needed his head clear and his mind sharp.

Above the cot, a large monitor gave Savoy full view of everything seen by Skullcruncher’s optic sensors. The control panel attached to the cot gave him full control of the mech’s body. It was almost as if he were there at Xel-Ha, and not a thousand miles away.

Savoy didn’t like it - he preferred to be on-site. That was not currently possible - he’d only just come out of his coma last week, and his body remained a mess. The controls were sluggish with an obvious response delay, and there was a limit to the actions he could tell Skullcruncher to take. Attinger had felt it was the best compromise, however - his best agent coupled with their best tech, with drones on standby.

And the other asset, Deadpool. He’d pitch in if Savoy wound up biting off more than he could chew. Apparently he and a nerd named Weasel had produced some interesting results with Cybertronian technology.

Whatever, Savoy thought. As long as he stays out of my way.

Skullcruncher swam into the bay. Already a few swimmers were pointing and screaming - the bay wasn’t very deep. Not a problem, Savoy thought - we want the tourists gone, don’t we? He directed the mech to fully surface, and guessed it would take less than five minutes for the civilians to flee in terror. Savoy had Skullcruncher let off a bloodcurdling roar for good measure.  
Yeah, look at ‘em run!

Now, Savoy thought, where’s the target? There was an energon reading in the area...

...and it was coming toward him.

It was showtime.

 

“Showtime!” Deadpool cried, making straight for the bay while a million and one panicked tourists streamed past him on either side. And some made right for him, staring back at the enormous crocodile and not where they were going. It was no easy feat swerving to avoid all of them, and a few meaty thumps indicated he hadn’t always succeeded.

“Sorry!” he called out as he barely missed two kids and their dog, only to send their portly father flying. “I’m sure he’ll be fine.”

The portly father landed on a snorkel kiosk, and his head ricoched off a nearby port-a-potty.

“Then again...”

Deadpool steered away from the traumatized children and drove into the bay with a loud splash. Ahead of him, the metal croc came right for him on an obvious intercept course.

“You’ve got a date with Samsonite!” he said, and he deployed the wagon’s armaments. No time for subtle; Deadpool fired sabot rounds and plasma cannons at the beast. The robocroc didn’t even try to evade the ordnance; instead, it took it in the jaw and head.

“Yeah!” Deadpool cried. “Man, this is gonna be easier than I...”

The croc’s tail swung around and slammed into the side of the wagon with enough force to knock the vehicle out of the water. It crashed down on the beach and rolled a few times before stopping, upside down.

“Oww,” said Deadpool. “Okay, now we play hardball!”

 

Savoy was having a ball. At first he’d been angry at the poor responses of the mech - no way to avoid the incoming fire from... a chimichanga wagon?!? - but then he’d accessed the tail attack and sent the target flying.

Except... was it the target? Not at all what he’d been expecting... but it was definitely an enemy. Savoy deployed Skullcruncher’s weapons while moving in for a jaw attack. Best to finish this opponent quickly.

And where was that merc Attinger had on standby?

No matter. Skullcruncher moved in for the kill...

...and the wagon transformed into a red bipedal mech armed with guns and swords. It leapt clear of Skullcruncher’s jaws and fired a plasma weapon that damaged one of his hind legs.

Definitely the target. Savoy returned fire with his own energy weapons, then moved in for another bite.

On the side of his cot, his phone rang. He ignored it. Now was not a good time for a call, even if it was Attinger.

 

Attinger slammed the phone down and swore mightily. And repeatedly. Why wasn’t Savoy answering? Probably because he’s engaged in battle, the rational part of his brain suggested. There wasn’t much of that part of his brain left.

Deadpool - damn his eyes! - had disobeyed a direct order to stay put, and then he had attacked the Skullcruncher unit! His two assets fighting in plain view of civilians, neither responding to his attempts to communicate and end the debacle. At this rate, the target would probably escape without detection.

He tried contacting both of them again, one last time, for all the good it would likely do. Savoy did not respond.

Deadpool, surprisingly, did.

“Hey, Beastie-boy,” the merc’s voice said through the comm. “Kinda busy right now.”

It wasn’t a lie. On the satellite image, the Deadpool mech fought to free himself from Skullcruncher’s mouth.

“Stop fighting this instant!” Attinger shouted. “That crocodile is...”

“...the target, I know,” Deadpool replied. On screen, his mech escaped the croc’s jaws far easier than he should have. Skullcruncher’s jaws had taken a lot of damage, and their effectiveness was compromised.

“No! The target is not...”

“...going to win this one,” Deadpool said. “You have my personal... ooh! Hot! Hot!”

On screen, Skullcruncher had let loose with the flame-jets in his mouth.

“Wilson,” Attinger spoke with barely-contained fury, “I order you...”

“...to kick this croc’s ass!” Deadpool leapt up and over the flame and came down on Skullcruncher’s head.

“No! Stand down, do you hear me? Stand...”

“...up to this guy, for truth, liberty and pink unicowww!” Skullcruncher’s tail snapped up and whipped the Deadpool mech in the face.

Attinger roared in frustration and pounded his desk with both fists, then called Cemetery Wind and gave the order to move in. It would take time for them to arrive, however. At least twenty minutes. The Slog unit wasn’t an option - it was heading for the growing situation in Chichen Itza, and was not built for speed at all. It would arrive long after it was all over. Drones would get there a lot faster; he sent in 3, with orders to put Deadpool out of action. He wanted to have them both destroyed, but he needed at least one mech to combat the real target.

“And someone get Savoy back in contact!” he added.

He would not - would NOT - call Lockdown and ask for his help.

“Told you you should’ve told Deadpool about the other asset.”

Attinger spun around in his chair to see the same worthless lackey standing in the doorway behind him,a fresh cup of coffee in his hands.

“I’m just saying...” the lackey added with the very words Attinger planned to engrave upon his tombstone.

“What is your name?” he asked.

“Grax, sir. Leland Grax.”

“Get out of my sight, Leland Grax,” Attinger said.

“But your coffee...”

“Get. Out.”

Leland Grax got out. Attinger made a point of remembering his name. He turned back to his monitors, and found that the situation had become much, much worse.


	3. Mexican Theme Park Standoff

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MechaDeadpool fights Skullcruncher. A busload of nuns enters the fray. Idiocy reaches new heights. And the waterslide becomes a victim of their folly.
> 
> And then, the real target arrives...

“Could this get any worse?” Savoy said as he directed Skullcruncher away from the busload of nuns. He could clearly hear, through the cybertronian’s audio receptors, every scream (and prayer) from each Sister of Mercy as the robot crocodile just missed them.

And collided with a boulder he hadn’t seen before, disabling the jaws completely.

He’d been about to win. The target had fallen flat in the water after Skullcruncher’s tail attack, and Savoy had pressed his advantage. He’d charged the croc mech forward, mouth open and ready to live up to its name.

And then a bus full of nuns - Nuns! - had come out of nowhere and driven right into the water between him and the target, and he’d been forced to swerve to avoid them.

Right into a boulder that hadn’t freaking been there a moment before! Where had that come from?

Much later, he would learn that a stray rocket had gone wild and hit the nearby highway, in front of the nun bus, just as it was passing Xel-Ha’s entrance. The driver had swerved and crashed through the park entrance, then rolled out of control through the park (scattering many frightened tourists fleeing in the other direction) until it hit the bay and came to a stop between the two warring robots.

Where the boulder had come from, he would find out much sooner.

Savoy backed Skullcruncher up, then gave him the order to transform. With the mouth and one hind leg out of action, the crocodile configuration was all but useless. Time to see what the robot mode could do.

Someone began pounding on his door. He ignored them.

 

Deadpool could not ignore the fact that something weird was going on. First, a busload of nuns just randomly shows up (actually, for him, that was kind of normal), and then the ground started shaking. A lot. Big chunks of rock began popping up, including the one Lake Placid had slammed into. Almost as if...

The crocodile transformed and attacked again. In robot mode it was much bigger than Deadpool’s mech, bulkier, and just as fierce.

“Gulp,” Deadpool said, and might have opined that he was going to need a bigger bot, but the reconfigured reptile didn’t give him the chance. It fired a plasma blast that hit MechaDeadpool in the left shoulder, blasting off his arm and sending him flying backward and into a large tubular fibreglass structure that curved round and round in a spiral...

“Aw, no!” Deadpool cried. “Not the waterslide!”

The giant bot stepped toward him, its foot grazing the nun bus as it stepped over. The bus fell on its side and began to fill with water. With its next footfall, the crocbot kicked up a wave that flung MechaDeadpool’s blasted-off arm at him. Its gun remained trained on his mech’s chest - it had him cold.

Then, as it was about to take a final step closer to the wreck that had once been a super-fun happy slide, it stopped.

And stayed still.

O-kay, Deadpool thought, and slowly reached for his left arm.

 

“Sir!” said the worthless lackey who’d grabbed Savoy’s arm. “You...” was all he got out before Savoy backhanded him hard in the face.

“I’m in a combat situation!” he snarled. “I ordered no interruptions.” He was somewhat impressed the lackey had managed to break the door open. And remain standing after he’d hit him. The unmanly squeal he’d let off as he clutched his bleeding nose did him no favours.

“Sir, Mr. Attinger orders you to respond!” the lackey said.

Savoy grunted, then considered. The lackey had had to break in here to get a message to him. It was, therefore, probably important. He checked his screen - the target remained down - then he clicked his comm back on.

“Savoy,” he said, in a tone of voice that said, fuck off.

“Stand down!” Attinger shouted over the comm, loud and angry enough that Savoy nearly flinched. “Stand down NOW. That’s an order!”

“The target is still active, sir,” Savoy replied.

“That,” Attinger said through what sounded like clenched teeth, “is NOT the target. That is my asset. Your backup!”

Savoy took a moment to process that information.

“He was supposed to...”

“Yes he was,” Attinger cut him off. “But he didn’t. All you two have accomplished is to put lives in danger!”

Savoy was taken aback. Since when did his boss care about collateral damage?

“If word gets back to the President,” Attinger went on, “or the media, that American lives were lost in an alien robot battle, my autonomy over this project could be compromised. There’ll be oversight and subcommitties made up of bleeding heart liberals tying our hands!”

Ah ha, Savoy thought. That’s the Attinger I know.

“So get your head back in the game, you blundering imbecile. And you can start by rescuing that bus full of nuns. The last thing we need is the Church up our asses.”

“Yes, sir,” Savoy said.

“And for God’s sake stay in contact!”

“Sir!” Savoy said, and he started to turn Skullcruncher around to face the ailing bus.

He’d barely started when the red mech leapt up out of the water, fully repaired and with its severed arm intact, and drove a sword into Skullcruncher’s groin.

 

“Weren’t expecting that, were ya?” Deadpool said, as he stabbed the robo-croc’s package. He knew cybertronians didn’t have sexual organs, so the attack was largely wasted. But damn, it was funny! At least, it was to him.

Deadpool slashed his sword out, ripping out some metal guts and energon, then spun around and hacked at Skullcruncher’s left knee. He’d meant to lop the limb off, but the armour there was a lot stronger and his blade only went halfway in. And got stuck.

Skullcruncher did not react right away. He certainly didn’t show any pain. When he’d lost the arm, Deadpool had felt that, all right; his bond with the mech went beyond the physical. Either this ‘bot was really, really tough...

...or it wasn’t alive at all.

Zombie transformer? he wondered. And while he wondered it, the crocasaurus woke up from its stupor and grabbed him. Then he threw MechaDeadpool arse over asshole into the side of the cliff that had until recently housed the waterslide. A number of parts inside the Merc’s mech went crunch, but not enough to take him out of the fight.

Unfortunately for Cemetery Wind in general, and Attinger and Savoy in particular, one bit that went crunch was the comm system.

Also, two things inside MechaDeadpool went squish. That may be significant later.

The croc mech had turned away, and was lumbering toward the bus full of nuns. It’s going to kill the nuns, Deadpool thought. Not only did they have to worry about their bus flooding, but now they had a robo reptile dude adding to their problems.

Of course, it wasn’t his problem. Nobody was paying him to rescue nuns, after all.

“Well, actually,” he told himself, “it kinda is. Protect the tourists, that sort of thing?”

“Aw, why don’t they just pray?” Deadpool replied to himself. “If a lightning bolt takes out Lake Placitron, it’s a miracle. But if they get squished, then it’s all part of the plan for the guy upstairs who moves in mysterious ways, and they all go to Heaven!”

“So we’re willing to let that dictitobot mush some nuns on our watch?” he responded, also to himself. It was getting a little confusing in his head, which he needed back in the game.

“Fuck the nuns,” he decided. “Let’s just kick ass and look awesome doing it!”

MechaDeadpool stood, drew his remaining sword and gun, and charged.

 

I should charge extra for this, Savoy thought as he approached the nun bus. Saving people wasn’t what he did. He reached the mech’s arms down to grab the vehicle...

And it came up out of the water to meet him. The monitor view shook, as if the mech itself were shaking. Seismic activity?

Skullcruncher began to lift the bus. Then a hail of sabot rounds ripped through his back and out his chest. Savoy’s eyes flicked to his scanning monitor, and saw an energon reading rapidly approaching from behind. The other asset? Savoy was certain he’d finished him off.

Before he could turn to look, the red mech leapt onto his back and climbed up to his shoulders.

“In your face, Crocodile Rock!” the mech said, and shoved its sword into Skullcruncher’s face. Right through an optic sensor.

“Gaah!” Savoy shouted. Then he let fly with some stronger language. “Fuck! Wilson, stand down!”

He hadn’t tested the vocal circuits in the mech before, but on paper they should work fine.

And they did. He knew because the red mech replied.

“Hey! Who told you my name? That’s classified!”

Then it stabbed Skullcruncher in the chest.

“Savoy!” Attinger’s voice cut in over the comm. “I can’t raise Wade Wilson. I need you to...”

“Talking to him now, sir,” Savoy replied while trying to remove the sword from his mech’s torso. The arms were clearly articulated to handle the task, but getting it done was just not happening.

Meanwhile, Wilson’s mech was on the offensive. He leapt up and used the sword in Skullcruncher’s chest as a stepping stone to jump up further.

“So what do they call you? Robogatosaurus?” he asked as he shot Savoy’s mech in the face. “I will NOT call you Crocosaurus. That movie where he fights Mega Shark was terrible! And it had that Urkel guy in it. Did you know he had his own cereal?”

Skullcruncher staggered back from the barrage, his arms flailing uncontrollably. By luck, an arm flail swatted Wilson’s mech out of the air, just before Skullcruncher fell over backward.

This wasn’t good at all. His mech had sustained serious injuries in both modes, compromising its effectiveness considerably.

“Get up, get up!” Savoy shouted at his controls, hoping to stand Skullcruncher back up through sheer force of will. Vision from the undamaged optic blurred again, and the scanner screen indicated another earth tremor. A serious one.

Then Wilson’s mech appeared in his field of vision, pointing a gun down at him.

“Stop! Cease and desist,” he cried, hoping his mech’s vocal circuits had miraculously escaped damage. “Wilson, we are on the same team.”

“What was that?” Wilson replied. “You did what to my mother? Oh, Crocky Balboa, that is going to cost you.”

“Wait!” Savoy roared in frustration, knowing his failure was imminent.

Then, a massive tremor threw both mechs into the air.

And Savoy’s scanner indicated a massive energon reading directly below them.

 

Attinger cursed whatever deity was responsible for the comedy of errors unfolding on the screens on his desk. Then he realized that deity was very likely him. He’d thought the worst had happened when his assets had begun fighting each other. Then, the truth of the matter became apparent. When the real target revealed itself.

“My... god...” he said. “Savoy! Get Skullcruncher back on his feet NOW!!!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Technically speaking, Xel-Ha does indeed have a waterslide. However, it is nowhere near as big or as prominent as my story might suggest. It certainly isn't a tubular spiral. I actually went to Xel-Ha once, and I could have sworn there was a waterslide just as I'd described it! This is why it pays to research before you start writing. I could have done the professional thing and cut the slide from the story. I should have done that. But I didn't. I decided, screw it, and left it in. This is fiction, after all. My Xel-Ha has a large spiral waterslide. So there.


	4. The Dweller In Xel-Ha’s Depths

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The main target, a titanic mech named Octopunch, reveals himself. He has tentacles. Lots of them. More than Savoy and Skullcruncher can handle.
> 
> The fate of the world rests on the metal shoulders of MechaDeadpool.

Deadpool picked himself (and his mech) up in time to see something truly funky. All around the bay, chunks of rock splashed upwards as something underneath them forced its way to the surface.

“Something tells me,” he said to himself, “I’m missing a big part of the big picture.”

No shit, himself replied.

There were further eruptions of rock. One of them barely missed Skullcruncher. Another barely missed the nun bus.

And one very nearly missed him.

“Ow!” he cried as his mech’s left leg was crushed. Good thing it shares my healing factor, he thought, and he chopped the boulder in half and pulled the mangled limb free.

And that was when he saw the tentacles.

Big, thick metallic tentacles, rising everywhere around the park. Most from under the water, but a few came through the shore as well, scattering rock and sand everywhere.

One tentacle snagged the croc bot. Another grabbed the bus full of nuns.

And the rumbling and breaking of ground got worse. A whirlpool formed in the middle of the bay, and then a large alien metallic bulb surged upward from within it.

“Did anybody see that movie, Deep Rising?” Deadpool asked as he watched the thing ascend from what had presumably been a millennia-long resting place. “Because this is starting to seriously resemble that...”

“Wilson!” Attinger’s voice cut through the din. “Stop babbling and get your head in the game. I swear, if you don’t respond this time...”

“Hey! Sideshow Bob’s back on the air,” Deadpool said. His healing factor had fixed his comm in the same way it had nearly repaired his leg. “Which target do you want me to shoot first? Doc Ock, or the croc?”

“The crocodile mech is my asset, not a target!” Attinger told him. “That octopus thing is the enemy, Wilson. Take it out! And make sure those nuns in the bus remain unharmed.”

A tentacle swung itself at MechaDeadpool. He leapt up and over it, then charged back into the bay toward the rising head.

...rising head? Heh, heh...

 

Savoy was in over his head. Training only prepares you for so much, he thought. Yes, he knew some Transformers were larger than others - the remains of that specimen from the Pyramids came to mind - but this thing that had grabbed Skullcruncher like he was a plastic toy was way out of his league. He could fire all the ordnance he had at the thing, but he suspected it would have little effect. He doubted even Optimus Prime could put a dent in it.

And yet, there was Wade Wilson charging his mech toward it with complete abandon. What an idiot! Brave, to be sure, but still an idiot.

“So what do they call you? Optipus Prime?” Wade taunted it. Skullcruncher’s vocals may have been damaged, but the audio worked just fine. “Squidatron? Tentakill? Claw-Jaw?”

“Be silent!” the creature roared. Savoy could just see that its massive beak had broken the surface.

“Never gonna happen,” Wilson opened fire on the tentacle holding the bus. “Mech with a mouth, that’s me...”

“You are in the presence of the grand and mighty Octopunch!” the thing replied, and lashed out a tentacle at him. “Long have I slumbered, waiting for the time of the rising.”

“Uh huh,” said Wilson, dodging the tentacle and then leaping up to catch hold of another. “So you’ve been asleep for centuries, only woke up now, and already you’re talking in perfect English!”

Octopunch tried to flick Wilson away. Instead he used the momentum of that flick to hurl himself over to the tentacle holding the bus.

“And this is a Spanish-speaking country!” he went on, hacking away at the metal limb with his sword. “You make no sense, Squidward.”

“Be silent!” Octopunch roared, reaching another tentacle toward him. “Heed my words. My return is but the beginning... ow!” he added. Deadpool had successfully cut through the tentacle holding the bus. It began to fall and MechaDeadpool caught it, just as the other tentacle grabbed him.

“Whoa!” Deadpool cried, managing to hold onto the bus but losing his sword. It flew through the air and sank into the limb holding Skullcruncher. That tentacle spasmed, and Savoy managed to dislodge an arm of his mech from its grip.

Wilson was in trouble. Octopunch needed taking down. Savoy targeted the limb holding MechaDeadpool and fired. A plasma blast followed by rockets slammed into the tentacle wrapped around the merc mech and blasted him free.

The act did not go unnoticed by Octopunch. He roared and swiveled his black eyes up to look at Skullcruncher.

“What’re you lookin’ at?” Savoy said, and he fired down into one of the dark orbs. It exploded spectacularly, and Octopunch shrieked in what could only be agony.

Then, systems all over Savoy’s monitor went off-line. The perspective on the monitor shifted rapidly, and then there was blackness. Whatever had just happened to the Skullcruncher mech had been bad.

“Savoy?” Attinger’s voice cut in.

“My unit is down,” Savoy told him. “I’ve failed.”

 

Deadpool didn’t fail to see the immature humour in Savoy’s last remark.

“Unit’s down, huh?” he said. “Have you tried Viagra?”

When the tentacle had released him (due to it having been blown off), he’d managed to somersault on the way down and landed his mech on his feet with the nun bus safely in his arms. He’d quickly carried it to shore and set it down very nearly gently, then turned back in time to see Octopunch crush What A Croc like a soda can. The big robo-octo flung the crushed remains down into the water, then focused its remaining eye on MechaDeadpool.

“Now is not the time for jokes, Wilson!” Attinger barked over the comm.

“It’s always time for jokes,” Deadpool replied, leaping to avoid a tentacle swipe. He landed on the offending limb, and proceeded to run along it toward its master.

Attinger continued to berate him for his lack of professionalism, so Deadpool ignored him. Instead, he took stock of his remaining offensive capabilities. Both swords were gone, one lodged in Crocowuss, one stuck in another tentacle. He’d also lost one of his sabot-shooting blasters. He still had the other, and a bunch of other guns, too. And would MechaDeadpool be worthy of the name D. P. if he didn’t have backup stabby things?

And of course there was his numero uno offensive weapon - his mouth!

“So you’re a giant octopus, huh? Gimmie MegaShark and Debbie Gibson and you’d be fucked, Ursula.” As he talked he opened fire on Octopunch’s face with sabot rounds and plasma blasts. The beast roared and covered its face with a tentacle.

“Actually, just gimmie Debbie Gibson,” Deadpool went on, transforming his mech back to wagon mode and racing faster toward the bulbous body. “I’d show her my electric youth, if you know what I mean.”

Octopunch tried to slap him again, this time with the tentacle the sword was stuck in. MechaDeadpool transformed, leapt up and over the offending limb and snagged his sword as he did so. He fired into the wound with a plasma blast, hitting a fuel line and detonating half the tentacle. The explosion flung MechaDeadpool forward, sword first, right at Octopunch’s remaining eye.  
Unfortunately for him, Octopunch had more than two tentacles. One shot out and grabbed the merc’s mech just a metre shy of his target and began to crush his waist.

“Not the squeeze I was hoping for,” Deadpool said, hacking away at the tentacle with his recently reacquired sword. He cut himself free, but another limb immediately took its place.

“Enough! I tire of this,” Octopunch said.

“You’re tired already? Weren’t you asleep for thousands of...”

“Silence!”

“Not my thing,” Deadpool said, hacking anew.

“Let us see how well you talk,” Octopunch said, “without a head!” So saying, he shoved MechaDeadpool into his beak and bit his head off.

 

Attinger groaned, and buried his face in his hands. It was over. He had failed.

It seemed that Savoy still had some control over the wreckage that was Skullcruncher; he’d turned the mech’s head to look up at the titanic Octopunch. Attinger had had a fantastic view of the destruction of MechaDeadpool. And with him, all hope.


	5. The Heart of Octopunch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fate of the world rested upon MechaDeadpool's shoulders. And his head got bitten off.
> 
> Octopunch reveals his true form, and proves quite unstoppable.
> 
> And then, Deadpool happens!

On his satellite radar screen, Attinger saw several blips coming in. The drone air strike he’d ordered. His hopes rose a tad, but not much. Against two squabbling mechs, a drone fleet had a high probability of success. Against that thing, however...

And then, that thing began to transform. Tentacles slapped together and became legs; the bulbous body split and became a massive chest and arms; the beak and eyes became torso and waist; the two most damaged tentacles dangled from its back; from the chest rose an alien head with tentacles for a beard.

Lovecraft enthusiasts would have said it resembled Cthulhu. And perhaps, Attinger thought, it was. He’d been around for thousands of years, and legends had to start somewhere.

The drones attacked. Octopunch staggered under their missile assault, then retaliated. His back tentacles, though damaged and shortened, still had plenty of reach. One swatted a drone from the air while Octopunch opened up with missiles and plasma blasts from arm cannons and shoulder launchers.

The drones fell from the sky, one by one, then two by two until they were all down.

Attinger watched it all, trying to hold his emotions in. That thing had tossed aside the best Cemetery Wind had to throw at it, and had barely been slowed down. He reached for his phone; time to call in everything they had. The nuclear option was now on the table, though how they would explain that to the Mexican government, he had no idea.

He might even have to call in Lockdown. This was a nightmare from which Cemetery Wind might never recover. Certainly Lockdown would never take them seriously again.

“Hear me, creatures of the human hive!” Octopunch said in a voice loud enough to damage the hearing of anyone within earshot. “You have sent your best and failed! Now you shall face my wrath. But know that I am merely the harbinger. My master rises, and the universe shall...”

Attinger looked up. He’d been about to redirect all Cemetery Wind’s forces to Xel-Ha, but Octopunch’s sudden silence grabbed his attention.

On screen, the titanic transformer lurched violently, clutching at himself, as though he were suffering some internal injury. He roared in what could only be agony, and started tearing bits of his chest.

“No!” he shouted. “You will not destroy... my... destiny...”

And then, the miracle happened.

 

A nun happened to be looking up at Octopunch, praying for a miracle (and to get her hearing back). She saw the great beast’s chest rip outward, and a man in a red suit of armour leapt out with something round and blue and shiny in one hand.

Octopunch fell to his knees with a loud splash, which kicked up one hell of a wave. Which the bus was in the direct path of.

“Oh,” said the nun. “Lord have mercy.”

 

“Wheee!” cried Deadpool as he leapt out of Octopunch’s chest with the robot’s spark in his hand. “I got the touch, I got the power.”

It was a long way down from the giant’s midsection to the bay. Deadpool might have sustained injury to his legs if Octopunch hadn’t fallen to his knees and kicked up a tsunami that snatched the merc out of the air. He tumbled arse over cock a couple of times before slamming into the rear of the bus, turning it into the wave as it hit.

The bus started to tip. Deadpool grabbed hold and anchored his metal boots in the sand. Together they rode out the wave.

“Whoa, that was wet,” Deadpool said, and he looked up and saw the long rectangular metal thing he’d clung to was the nun bus. Inside, some of the sisters pointed at him and cheered. Words like Saviour and Godsend were bandied about. Deadpool drank it all in.

“I saved them. How about that? I’m a hero!” Then he noticed both his metal-gloved hands were empty. “Hey! Where’s my trophy?”

He looked, and saw the spark of Octopunch in the sand further up the beach. He walked over and picked it up, then turned and held it over his head.

“I have the power!” he cried, and the nuns made further cheers of praise.

That was when Deadpool noticed Octopunch falling forward.

“Oh, hamburgers,” he said.

“Fuck me,” went one of the nuns.

And Octopunch’s carcass hit the shore and crushed the bus like a steamroller over a puppy with cancer.

 

It didn’t take long for Deadpool to find his mech. Once it had finished repairing itself, the headless MechaDeadpool simply stood up and walked to shore.

Skullcruncher did not have a healing factor; his ruined body remained where it had fallen. Deadpool considered salvaging it; if he could get it back to Weasel...

Heck, if he could get Octopunch back to Weasel...!

But then the Mexican authorities had turned up, Cemetery Wind with them. They cordoned off the entire area, and proceeded with the cleanup.

Deadpool had his own cleanup to do. When he transformed his mech back to wagon mode, he was reminded of the two tourists he’d tied up. That reminder was splattered all around and about the wagon’s interior.

“Oops,” he said, looking at the mangled remains. With them, an unknown number of tourists and a busload of nuns all dead thanks to him, Deadpool had a feeling Attinger would be more than a little miffed.

A squad of Cemetery Wind troops surrounded him.

“Hey!” Deadpool cried as one of them snatched up Octopunch’s spark chamber. “That’s mine! Get your own.”

“This is property of the United States’ government,” the trooper replied.

“Well I don’t remember the U. S. government ripping it out of Squidpants over there,” Deadpool indicated the giant carcass. “Hand it back, or I’ll rip out your own spark chamber!”

The troops raised their weapons. Deadpool raised his. He felt confident; even if he wasn’t encased in his headmaster armour, he had his healing factor. And he had his wagon. Speaking of which...

He gave a mental command, and the wagon deployed weapons and pointed them at the Cemetery Wind troops.

“Your move,” Deadpool said. “And mine’s a lot bigger than yours. And yes, I am referring to my...”

“Lumbertackel! Stand down,” boomed the voice of Attinger in all their comms. “You too, Wilson. Now listen up. You’re all being reassigned.”

 

Attinger switched the comm off and watched the satellite image of Xel-Ha. Cemetery Wind rushed about like ants, preparing to ship out to Chichen Itza. A team would of course stay behind to salvage and secure all the alien tech, including Skullcruncher. The repurposed cybertronian had performed poorly, an opinion he shared with Savoy. His best soldier had given him a full report on the functionality of the mech and the controls - he did not recommend the use of the Skullcruncher or Slog units in further combat situations.

And yet, Deadpool’s mech had performed flawlessly. How had that been possible? And Deadpool himself had some armour that turned him into his mech’s head. Was that the detail that had given MechaDeadpool, as he called it, his fluidity of movement?

That merc had something, and it was time to find out what it was.

Unfortunately it would have to wait. The standoff at Chichen Itza had become a flashpoint. And, Octopunch had said something about a master, rising. In all likelihood he’d been referring to the Fallen, whose minions had said similar things. Woke up too late, Attinger thought.

But if he hadn’t been referring to the Fallen... if his master was indeed rising...

And did it have anything to do with the Chichen Itza situation?

Things were indeed getting interesting.

“Sir? Hi,” said the hapless lackey named Grax, who’d appeared in the doorway behind him. “The President is on line two. He wants to talk about the Mexico situation. I think he’s pissed at you, sir.” Was that the hint of a smile at the corners of his lips?”

“Thank you, Grax,” he said. “Was that all?” he asked when Grax failed to fuck off and die.

“No, that’s everything,” Grax said, then nodded at the phone. “Better take that call, don’t you think?”

Yes, he was definitely smiling.

“That will be all, Grax,” Attinger said. He turned away and picked up the phone, and got exactly the earful he’d expected.

Grax lingered, clearly loving it. Attinger resisted the urge to murder him outright. Nothing so merciful as a bullet, he thought, glaring like a predator at Grax’s reflection on his monitor. A reflection superimposed over the satellite feed of the salvaging of Skullcruncher. Attinger tapped the screen, tapping the images of both Grax and Skullcruncher together.

Yes, Attinger thought, I will think of a very creative fate for you...

 

The End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Continued in:  
> Merc Vs. Metal: Deadpool Gets Primed


End file.
